Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations

In Final Debate, Clinton Accuses Trump Of Using ‘Scare Rhetoric’ On Abortion

“If you go with what Hillary is saying, in the ninth month you can take the baby and rip the baby out of the womb of the mother just prior to the birth of the baby," Donald Trump said, after affirming that he would appoint anti-abortion justices to the Supreme Court. Hillary Clinton fired back, saying, "The government has no business in the decisions that women make with their families."

The New York Times:
Donald Trump Won’t Say If He’ll Accept Result Of Election
The two candidates also tangled over abortion rights. After initially declining to flatly say whether he would support overturning Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion, Mr. Trump conceded that the justices he would appoint to the court would do just that. “If we put another two or perhaps three justices on, that’s really what will happen,” he said. “That’ll happen automatically in my opinion.” (Healy and Martin, 10/19)

The Wall Street Journal:
Final Debate: Donald Trump Declines To Commit To Respecting Results If He Loses
Mr. Trump promised he would appoint justices who would overturn the Roe v. Wade abortion decision and protect gun rights. “They will have a conservative bent,” he said. “I will be appointing pro-life judges.” Mrs. Clinton said she would choose justices who would protect abortion rights, same-sex marriage and overturn Citizens United, which removed limits on corporate and union spending in elections. “The Supreme Court needs to stand on the side of the American people, not on the side of the powerful corporations and the wealthy,” she said. (Meckler, Bender and Nicholas, 10/20)

The Washington Post:
At Third Debate, Trump Won’t Commit To Accepting Election Results If He Loses
Trump went on to describe late-term abortion procedures in graphic language, suggesting that many women end their pregnancies in the final one to four days. “You can take the baby and rip the baby out of the womb,” he said. Clinton used the moment to make a gender-based argument, telling Trump: “You should meet with some of the women I’ve met with, women I’ve known over the course of my life. This is one of the worst possible choices that any woman and her family could possibly make. . . . The government has no business in the decisions that women make with their families.” (Tumulty and Rucker, 10/19)

Meanwhile, the candidates also took questions on Medicare —

The Washington Post:
Trump, Clinton Answers On Social Security Were Victories For The Left
Chris Wallace’s questions did assume that entitlements needed to be cut. He asked Trump if would “make a deal to save Medicare and Social Security that included both tax increases and benefit cuts, in effect, a grand bargain on entitlements,” and asked Clinton if she would back “a deal that includes both tax increases and benefit cuts.” But neither candidate accepted the premise. Trump insisted, tautologically, that his tax cuts would spur the economy “to grow at a record rate of growth,” solving any problem with entitlement spending. Clinton said she would raise taxes on the rich to expand benefits; “that will come from either raising the cap and/or finding other ways to get more money into it,” she said. “I will not cut benefits. I want to enhance benefits for low-income workers and for women who have been disadvantaged by the current Social Security system.” (Weigel, 10/20)

And media outlets fact check some of the debate's health care claims —

The Associated Press:
Fact Check: Trump, Clinton And Their Debate Claims
Clinton is basically on target, but Medicare's funding problems are more complicated than she implies. The 2010 health care law was partly financed with cuts in future payments to hospitals, insurers and other Medicare service providers. According to projections at the time, that extended the solvency of the Medicare trust fund to 2029. (Otherwise Medicare would have been unable to fully pay its bills in 2017.) Republican budgets since then have kept Obama's Medicare cuts. But the health care law did not solve Medicare's financial problems. (10/20)

Modern Healthcare:
ACA Troubles Make Fleeting Appearance In Final Clinton-Trump Debate
Republican nominee Donald Trump's claim that premiums in the healthcare plans in the Affordable Care Act exchanges are increasing by as much as 100% is an exaggeration, but the candidates spent little time digging into the matter.
In the waning moments of the final presidential debate Wednesday, the candidates used a question about entitlements to restate their positions on the ACA. Trump again vowed to “repeal and replace” the law and that he was glad premiums had gone up, presumably to make his point that President Barack Obama's signature healthcare reform law was “destroying our country.” (Muchmore, 10/19)

KHN offers clips from when the candidates talked about health care —

Kaiser Health News:
Video Highlights: Health Care On The Debate Stage
In the third and final presidential debate Wednesday, candidates Donald Trump, the Republican, and Hillary Clinton, the Democrat, had their most extended exchanges on health care issues to date. Here are the video excerpts of those two discussions from the debate, which was held at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. (10/20)

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